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I think we did four sites in a day (actually twice) but there is one that is a bit out of town that I have not seen. But the ones in town are easily walkable, as I remember, two of them are quite compact. We stayed overnight on one visit as we were coming from Venice, then going onward, maybe to Florence. But if Bologna is not too long of a train ride, I would think doing it as a day trip would be just fine.

Thank you, Suec1. We are trying to decide whether or not to do a Croatia-Greece cruise for a week or spend the week doing places like Ravenna, Bologna, and Florence before going on to Venice and Verona.

We did a cruise once that included Croatian ports, Corfu and a day in Ravenna. Unfortunately, I can't remember the cruise line - It was about 10 years ago. Maybe a good cruise agent would know the answer.

Gwen, I've ruled out the cruise which stops at Ravenna (if we do, in fact, cruise at all) since the other ports on the particular itinerary aren't all that interesting, among other factors, but I appreciate your suggestion.

We drove through Ravenna years ago and stopped for lunch and a long afternoon walking around which was plenty for us. I agree that binoculars can be good and I always bring a small mirror to Italy which help you see the painted ceilings without hurting your neck.

Yes they can be done in a day, buy a "24" hour ticket. We stayed over but the timing was something like 2pm to 11am and certainly that would work out well to be like a day trip. You'd need to check opening times to make best use and I suspect Mondays would be tricky (but I don't know). The smaller sites can be affected by queues, so knock them off early before the buses turn up.

The Faenza museum is fantastic, we had the place to ourselves and a time limit to catch a train. Did a 2 hour run through (literally)

The Classe mosaics are a bit out of town and I think would require a taxi. We missed them, and I have been sorry ever since. You could do them all in a day from Bologna by rail if you were willing to make it a longish day.

Thank you very much for your very helpful replies. I do wonder, however, exactly what the binoculars are supposed to do. Are they helpful in magnifying the detail on ceilings? Are these buildings like the Church on the Spilled Blood (for those of you who may be familiar with it) in terms of ceiling height, building size...?

Yes, the binoculars are for seeing details since many of the mosaics are high on walls and ceilings, which can be highly detailed. Other travelers spotted me using my compact 6x18 compact binoculars (more like opera glasses magnification) and commented to me that they wish they had them.

You can also take the number 4 bus from the Ravenna train station or from a stop along Via di Roma to reach Classe.

As mentioned, the majority of the sights are easily walkable from one another. After two six-night stays for mosaic workshops, I average 15 minutes at most to walk from one side if the center to the other.

Can't lay my hand on an old trip report I wrote, but you can reach Classe by city bus quite easily. You buy (or at least bought) tickets at a booth to the right of the train station as you exit. You then cross the street in front of the station, and, while facing the station, take the bus running to the right.

On the binoculars -- while we were there a group of Italian school children visited. One asked to try my binoculars, and they passed through the entire group before returning to me, along with many thanks.